My wife is so untidy what can I do

[DadofDD]

would really welcome a female perspective on this, my wife is so untidy. She leaves clutter everywhere. I wipe the worktop down come back it’s got crumbs on it. Every surface in the house has stuff pilled up on it, cupboards brimmed with papers and stuff.
We have argued over this for many years our DD is 8 and each year it’s gotten worse. It causing me serious resentment towards her. She’s a very emotional person I tried to tell her how I feel and it was a whole night of upset tears argument….I love my wife and family so much, when we’re not arguing over we get on really well…but I feel this is really pulling us apart ..what on earth can I do.?

Also don’t buy loads of stuff for the kids. My kids have two pairs of shoes each, one is sandals and two coats - a winter and summer one. We don’t buy excessive stuff because I know organising it isn’t a strong point of mine. Buying less stuff would help.

Is a cleaner really the answer unless cleaner comes every other day?

It sounds like it would be nice if OPs wife would tidy up after herself/do the basics though agree it has been so long sounds likes acceptance is the only route.

So you don’t cook for the family?
Therefore you don’t clean up after family meals, or have to think about them?

You don’t do laundry for the family (kids) or tidy their stuff?

I’m sure you’re right you have too much stuff in the house.

I think you’re massively underestimating how difficult it is to ‘be tidy’ if you’re the one responsible for everything for a growing family. It’s not the same as tidying and cooking for one.

Empty the dishwasher! It’s your house. So what if it’s not plates you particularly ate off?

Well if it were me a skip is what I would get. There is no way I'd be able to tolerate the mess you've described. I say this as a person who is untidy. But I can't stand my house being like that so my solution is a housekeeper. My husband is the neatest person ever. He's amazed at the mess I can create but we learnt to live with each other by dividing household jobs into what each of us are good at. And I've found it best to never ask someone to do a job they hate. That's counter productive. My housekeeper hates cleaning windows so I get a man for that. As an example. So have a good think on what would work for you and your wife.

BTW, my DH didn't hoard useless stuff. He bought too much of everything, he couldn't get rid of anything, and he couldn't find the way to tidy or put anything away. Not all hoarders keep rubbish, empty bottles etc. some just don't have a brake on them, they are like a runaway train just going on gathering forever. Much of the stuff he had was perfectly good stuff, but no-one needed all of it. When he died, I was left to sort through it, and it was heartbreaking to see the unused stuff. I'm not making this thread about me, just trying to debunk some stereotypes about hoarding.

She's using an emotional response to avoid facing criticism. Agree kitchen is disgusting, pic three wouldn't be so bad if it were the only cluttered spot in the house but I can guarantee it isn't. No idea how you approach it except to call her on using tears and shouting to avoid facing the truth

The anger worries me.

They're not your wife's possessions, they're family possesions, surely? Stay away from her clothes, jewellery etc, of course. But furniture, everything in the kitchen, all towels, bedlinens, everything for your DD, all of that is shared ownership and responsibility, and you need a joint plan for how much of you need to keep, and how you keep it clean and organised. She wants all of it, in a mess; you want far less of it, clean and tidy. Find a compromise. Think in terms of being good parents showing their child how to live, how to value and care for their possessions. I'd go for a clean, tidy, decluttered kitchen, and ignore the rest for now!

But if you can’t unload the dishwasher because the cupboards are too full, presumably of plates and cups etc they are family belongings not ‘her’ belongings? So you need to sit down and say ‘as a family how many pans do we need- what can we get rid of?

Kitchen utensils aren’t ‘her belongings’ if they are part of the household goods!

It’s an Americanism. Everyone grew up watching Friends and Gilmore Girls and has copied it. Before the pedants come galloping up to say Shakespeare used it, he may have done so but it fell out of use in the U.K. and has come back again.

I have adhd and am like your wife.

Bugs me too

This is absolutely not acceptable. You have opted out, leaving your wife to run an entire house, and then blame her for the mess. Opt out of her stuff, by all means, and do all the kids things for a few months and see how on top of things you are then.
You say she didn't empty the dishwasher. Perhaps she is waiting for you to do it? And you are both passive aggressively only dealing with your own personal items! Which would work, except you share a house with your children as well.
What I can say about hoarding / throwing things away, is that it is often linked to emotional pain and control. I would freak out as well when my dh tried to 'declutter'. In fact, he had checked out of our marriage and was having multiple affairs which he thought I didn't know about. My belongings and my children's belongings grew to have emotional meaning beyond being 'stuff'. Him trying to throw them out was interpreted by me as a symbolic throwing away of us! (I now see)

Total bollocks. It's not an Americanism. Plenty of people in the UK have used the word gotten for decades.

Some people are horribly messy, unfortunately it just seems to be the way they are. I'd find it difficult to live with, too.

Someone mentioned a book called a slob comes clean. There are two books I’ve found with this title on Amazon. What author did you mean please?

If she is a hoarder, which is what you are hinting at, she has MH issues. I’d say you would need to approach that as an illness rather than just ‘she is untidy and lazy’.

But the ‘I’m doing my own washing and my dd SOMETIMES‘ says it all about the dynamics in your couple.
Same with all the stuff sardes in the dishwasher for two days btw.

What it says is that you think you are doing a lot when you don’t do even half of the stuff that needs doing (wiping crumbs from the countertop that you’ve just used is pretty normal btw). But expect her to be on the top of stuff.
If you were actually doing 90% of the HW, then you’d have a point. But so far that’s not the feeling I got.

Fwiw a few years ago I went on strike and just stopped. I stopped cooking, pushing the hoover around etc… I didn’t have a meltdown or anything. I just waited for DH to finally wake up and do stuff.
Why? I was chronically ill, struggling to go to work, look after the dcs etc… but somehow I was still doing more than half of the HW, parenting and so on. I stopped the stuff I found the hardest to do and waited for dh to pick up the slack. What you are describing could easily be that too….

I think most of the obvious things have already been said OP. I'm messy like your wife. I don't think DH believes me but I honestly can't help it. I run around like a blue arsed fly all day and still don't get nearly enough done around the house (I work FT as well). We argue about it every few months. I was brought up in a messy house so our house never looks that bad to me.

Things that help us:

Declutter. DH is very good at leading on this. The one rule is that he is not allowed to touch or pass comment on the inside of my wardrobe (as long as the doors still shut!).

For stuff your wife is having trouble letting go of, you could try a phased declutter. Box up things you don't use often and put them somewhere else (garage, loft etc). If you don't end up going and retrieving them after 6-12 months, then get rid. But be careful you don't just end up buying replacements!

Dishwasher: DH fills it, I empty it. Somehow that keeps the momentum going.

Agree with pp saying divide the household jobs according to your strengths. Don't expect her to do jobs that require a high attention to detail.

It's hard when there's a buildup of resentment but try and make yourself comment positively when she does get some tidying/cleaning done, even if it's not perfect. DH sometimes doesn't seem to notice the stuff I do manage to get done, even if it took me ages, and it's really demotivating.

Oh, and don't separate laundry by whose it is. That is a bit petty and just makes more work. Have 1 big laundry basket for the family and separate by colour.

I admit I haven't read every single post, and didn't see the photos, bit it sounds as though your wife has ADHD or is a hoarder or both.

Hoarding is really a mental health issue (often has its roots in abandonment/insecurity), ADHD is a whole other ball game. Neither will respond well to nagging, cleaners, threats, you throwing everything out etc etc. I'm sorry, this really is difficult territory. What I haven't seen in your posts is you wife's perspective/response to any of this - what does she say/do?

All of her things?
Do you mean all the cups and glasses and plates that are filling the kitchen cupboard so much you can’t tidy up are all hers? You never use them, they are not part of the the household stuff? They are just hers and no one else is ever using them?

You have an interesting attitude….

A cleaner won't tidy papers.

My DM is/was like this - she likes a 'clean' house but has a filing cabinet with papers and then other papers relating to books she's writing and her German language class. There's also a bit of clutter.

Honestly not changed much over years and I'm sure inherited from her own DF.

Is she dirty or does she have lots of stuff?

Having lots of clutter makes cleaning much more difficult and overwhelming.

My mum has OCD and was a clean freak. She then started accumulating more and more stuff which made things harder to clean and eventually she just stopped bothering.

She is now a full blown hoarder and most rooms you can’t even get into and those you can like kitchen, bedroom & bathroom you can’t see the windows as it’s piled from floor to ceiling.

The not getting a skip stood out to me - as none of us have ever been able to help my mum clear out as she refuses to get rid of any stuff.

If she is starting to hoard then I would start putting my foot down about new things coming into the house for now.

I would also concentrate on modelling good behaviour.
So you put in lots of effort to come home and clean and tidy, so she sees if you can work long hours but still keep the house tidy then it may shame/encourage her to do more.
After a couple of weeks you can then start saying that you’re doing X,Y,Z after working all day and she needs to do X. Then a few weeks later she needs to do X and Y. And keep going.

Could she have one room that is her own, for all of her "stuff"? My DH is untidy and collects silly stuff. It is all in one room - and the rest of the house is very tidy. He just had 3 weeks off work, and I asked him if he could tidy his room a bit. There's stuff all over the floor, and the armchair is piled high with crap. He had 3 whole weeks and it didn't get done. At least I can keep the door shut and pretend that room doesn't exist. Failing that, I would get a binbag and scoop all of her stuff in to it, on a daily basis. Dump it on her pillow.

She seems to have hoarding issues if she can't cope with throwing the slightest mug away.

My mother is like this. I don't even go to her house any more. It makes me ill.

There are resources online which can help you determine if the clutter is at problem-level. If it is, please do something, for your daughter's sake. Being the child of a hoarder is something I haven't yet recovered from, and I'm 50 soon

If you google it, it originates from North America.

Really because of my info in the photos?